Adjustable Heel Yoke

ABSTRACT

A heel yoke system for securing a person&#39;s shod feet to skis, roller skates, crampons, or any other paraphernalia wherein the placement of the heel yoke is adjustable to provide a perfect fit for almost any kind of shoe over a wide range of sizes.

CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application claims the benefit of Provisional Patent ApplicationNo. 61/400,463 for “Weight Lifting Sandals and Their Weights” filed onJul. 27, 2010 by Thomas Jay Zeek

Much of the peripheral hardware shown in this application first appearedin Provisional Application for Patent No. 61/191,171 filed on Sep. 4,2008 for “Weight lifting shoes and their weights” from Thomas Jay Zeek,and is shown in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 12/583,854 filed onAug. 26, 2009 for “Weight Lifting Shoes” from Thomas Jay Zeek.

FEDERALLY SPONSORED RESEARCH OR DEVELOPMENT

Not Applicable.

SEQUENCE LISTING OR PROGRAM

Not Applicable.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

This invention is for a method of attaching a person's shod feet todevices such as snow boards, skis, roller skates, etc. It is a heel yokethat is very adjustable which works with straps to fit a wide variety ofshoes and shoe sizes to hold a person's foot securely to whateverapparatus it is a part of.

Finding ways to affix ice skates, skis, roller skates, crampons, andother paraphernalia to a person's shod feet has been an ongoing problemfor centuries. Most people beyond a certain age remember the old rollerskates that used a key to tighten them onto the sole of a shoe and aleather strap over the ankle to secure their heel to the roller skate.Those contraptions normally worked well enough for about fifteen minutesbut the roller skate often came off of the user's foot at the front endas was left hanging by the leather strap. The invention was cleverenough but it needed improvement to be used for anything important.

A very secure system for attaching crampons to boots can be seen in U.S.Pat. No. 5,901,471 to Warner but that system requires the user to wearheavy boots to protect their ankles from some of the hardware and thefront clip part of the crampons will only fit on certain kinds of shoesand boots.

U.S. Pat. No. 7,040,633 to Coburn shows a very secure and comfortablesystem for affixing roller skates to a shod foot but it requires thatthe shoes be made with a special part on the heel to work with thatsystem. Its bulkiness also would make an issue of where to store themwhen they're not being used and its large elaborate parts would beexpensive to manufacture

Innumerable configurations of straps have been devised to secure sandalsto people's feet and many of those configurations might be used toattach a ski or roller skate to a shod foot but straps alone will almostalways have some give in every direction and aren't really practicalwhen something needs to be really secure.

Another way people have sought to solve this problem is by the use ofboots or shoes that are specifically designed to attach to skis orbicycle pedals. That system is very effective and also very expensive,and it normally renders the shoe or boot useless for all otheractivities.

The problem of affixing things like skis and roller skates is sodifficult that sellers of roller skates in the United States have mostlygiven up, and sell almost exclusively roller skates that have their ownshoe or boot permanently and integrally attached to the skates. Thissetup has been made more practical with the advent of cheap imports, butit is still a problem for parents to buy new roller skates every timetheir child's shoe size changes. It even brings up the question ofwhether their child is even going to do any roller skating before theirshoe size changes again.

The use of integrally attached shoes or boots, or of specialized bootssuch as ski boots is not only expensive but it can also make activitiessuch as roller skating, skiing, and snowboarding impractical if notimpossible for people who need special shoes because of bone deformitiesor injuries to their feet, or who need one shoe sole thicker than theother.

There remains a need for and it is the object of the current inventionto provide a means for attaching skis, roller skates, climbingequipment, and other paraphernalia to a person's shod feet that isinexpensive, highly adjustable, compact, and extremely reliable andeffective.

BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The current invention is an adjustable, rigid, open backed heel yokesystem that works in conjunction with straps and buckles to fit and holdsecurely to a wide range of shoes and boots.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE SEVERAL VIEWS OF THE DRAWINGS

FIGS. 1-3 are various views of a weight lifting sandal that is made withthe heel yoke of this invention.

FIGS. 4A & 4B show a weight lifting sandal with the current heel yokecorrectly strapped to a user's shod foot.

FIGS. 5A-5C show a person doing various exercises with weight liftingsandals that have the heel yoke of this invention.

FIGS. 6 & 7 are exploded views of the weight lifting sandal shown inFIGS. 1-5C.

FIG. 8 shows a roller skate that is made with the heel yoke of thisinvention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

A preferred embodiment of the current invention is shown in FIGS. 1(rear perspective), 2 (front perspective), and 3 (top view).

FIGS. 1-3 show a weight lifting sandal made with the adjustable heelyoke of this invention. The weight lifting sandal is an article offootwear which enables a person to pick up weights with their feet. Theweight lifting sandal is equipped with tabs 64L and 64R that attach tocorresponding hardware on weights or weight holding devices that aremade for use with these sandals. FIGS. 5A-C show a person doingexercises with these sandals.

The heel yoke 12 is basically U shaped and it has an open back design sothat shoes and boots of varying shapes will fit into it. It is designedto only contact the user's shoe above the user's heel because if itapplies pressure below the user's heel it might tend to pull their shoeoff. It also has a slight front to back curve to make it fit the heel ofa person's shoe at the correct angle at the top.

The heel yoke 12 is attached to the heel yoke anchors 14 by means ofholding screws 22 that protrude through horizontal slots 18 in the heelyoke anchors and through vertical slots 16 in the bottom ends of theheel yoke. The holding screws 22 are fitted with washers 20 and wingnuts 24.

The heel yoke anchors 14 can slide in and out of the sandals to adjustthem for the width of the user's shoe. This is accomplished by looseningthe width adjustment screws 28 no more than about half of a turn andthen pushing or pulling the heel yoke anchors into the desired position,and then tightening the width adjustment screws again. The widthadjustment screws 28 go into tee nuts 30 that are embedded in the bodyof the sandals. The tee nuts 30 are visible in FIGS. 6 and 7. Thisprocess only needs to be done once until the user gets new shoes andthen it can be repeated for the new shoes.

The heel yoke anchors 14 do not have to fit the width of the user'sshoes tightly because the sandals have a non-slip surface 60 which willnot allow the user's foot to move around, although tightness of the heelyoke anchors can be used in some applications if desired, as in theroller skate shown in FIG. 8. The non-slip surface 60 is made from thesame sandpaper type of material that is normally found on the decks ofskateboards.

The wing nuts 24 should be loose when the user first places their footonto the sandal and when the user has their foot placed correctly on thesandal they can then push the heel yoke 12 tightly against the back oftheir shoe. This is the major object of this invention. The heel yoke ofthis invention can be positioned forward and backward and at varyingheights and tilts so they will fit a wide variety of shoe styles, willcontinue to fit over years of shoe size changes, can be shared or handeddown among different members of a household, and boots are neverrequired to protect the ankles or the Achilles tendon.

With their foot placed on the sandal and the heel yoke 12 pressed firmlyagainst the back of their shoe the user can tighten the wing nuts 24 tolock the heel yoke into that position. The user then feeds the longstrap 34 back & forth across their shoe through the buckles 42 on thefront straps 38 and finally through the buckle 42 on the heel bucklestrap 36 and then presses the long strap 34 back onto itself. The longstrap 34 is hook & loop material and the long strap's end 35 is the hookmaterial while the rest of the long strap is loop material.

The long strap 34 and the heel buckle strap 36 are attached to the heelyoke 12 by circular shaped fasteners, in this example they are ordinarybrass grommets 32, which allow the direction of the straps to be changedas needed to make the straps lay flat on the user's shoes, and the sameis true of the front straps 38 being attached by the front grommets 40.It is desirable to make the length of the heel buckle strap adjustable.

FIGS. 4A-B show the weight lifting sandals with the current heel yokesystem correctly strapped to a user's shod foot.

FIGS. 5A-C show a person using weight lifting sandals with the currentheel yoke system to do various exercises. When the straps are cincheddown correctly the heel yoke system of this invention prevents anysporting gear from moving or becoming maladjusted even under extreme orprolonged stress such as would be experienced from lifting weights andwalking with these sandals. The straps do not have to be uncomfortablytight for this invention to work.

FIG. 6 shows an exploded view of a weight lifting sandal with the heelyoke system of this invention without the straps 34, 38; the non-slipsurface 60; the covering plate 50; or the grommets 40.

The heel yoke anchors 14 go into the recesses 44 and the tee nuts 30which are barely visible go into the width adjustment slots 26. The teenuts 30 protrude through holes 47 in the base plate 46 by less than thethickness of the heel yoke anchors 14 so the heads of the widthadjustment screws 28 will contact the heel yoke anchors before they hitthe tee nuts. The use of the width adjustment screws 28 is described inparagraph 0024 above. The only reason the tee nuts 30 protrude at all isto maximize the number of threads in the tee nut so they won't bestripped. If the base plate 46 was thicker then the tee nuts 30 could beflush with the base plate 46, and the width of the width adjustmentslots 26 would be reduced to the diameter of the width adjustment screws28.

The depth of the recesses 44 is exactly equal to the thickness of theheel yoke anchors 14 so that the covering plate 50 will make directcontact with the heel yoke anchors to help hold the heel yoke anchorsdown.

FIG. 6 also shows detail of the holding screws 22, wing nuts 24, and thewashers 20 that hold the heel yoke 12 to the heel yoke anchors 14.

The holding screws 22 have a thin flat head to minimize interferencewith ingress & egress of the user's shoe. They go through the horizontalslots 18 in the heel yoke anchors 14 and then through the vertical slots16 in the heel yoke 12. The slots 16 & 18 are what make this embodimentof this invention work. The horizontal slots 18 allow the holding screws22 and thereby the heel yoke 12 to be positioned forward & backward andthe vertical slots 16 allow the heel yoke to be positioned at anydesired height.

After the holding screws pass through the heel yoke anchors and the heelyoke they are fitted with washers 20 and wing nuts 24 that are tightenedto hold the heel yoke in the desired position. The holding screws 22 aremade by filing down the heads of carriage bolts because carriage boltshave the square section 23 that prevents them from turning inside of thehorizontal slots when the user is trying to tighten the wing nuts.

A thin layer of rubber can be put on the outside of the heel yokeanchors for increased friction to help hold the heel yoke in place butfor most applications that is unnecessary.

FIG. 7 is an exploded view of the weight lifting sandal without the heelyoke 12 or straps but with the covering plate 50 and the non-slipsurface 60 not shown in FIG. 6.

The bottom plate 52 has holes to accept the big part of the tee nuts 30and it is the same thickness as the big part of the tee nuts so that aflat surface is created when the sandal is assembled. The front bottomplate 54 is a piece of steel that is bent to create tabs that the frontstraps 38 can be attached to and it is also the same thickness as thebottom plate 52. The tee nuts 30 go through the holes 47 in the baseplate 46 into the recesses 44 that are created by gluing the T plate 48onto the base plate 46.

The covering plate 50, the T plate 48, the base plate 46, and the bottomplate 52 are all made of polycarbonate. They are glued together with asuitable glue along with the front bottom plate 54 and the tee nut 30,and then the curved heel section 62 is glued onto the back of all ofthem. Then the rubber laminate 66 is glued onto the bottom of everythingand the non-slip surface 60 is glued onto the top. The non slip surface60 does not cover the entire curved heel section 62 because that wouldprevent it from flexing.

The covering plate 50 helps to hold down the heel yoke anchors 14 andprovides a surface to glue down the non-slip surface 60 over the heelyoke anchors. Both the covering plate 50 and the non-slip surface 60have holes to accommodate the heads of the width adjustment screws 28.

The curved heel section 62 is made of ordinary rubber and is there tofacilitate walking. It is designed to flex if pressure is applied by theuser's shoe because if it applies force to the user's shoe at that lowpoint it might tend to pull their shoe off. The curved heel section 62being flexible ensures that all of the pressure will be borne by theheel yoke 12 above the user's heel.

The heel yoke can be made of a variety of different metals and plasticsprovided that the plastic does not become brittle in cold weather, or itcan be made from several pieces of differing material including leatherand cloth for the uppermost portion of it, but a rigid design ispreferred to help the heel yoke apply pressure high on the back of aperson's shoe.

FIG. 8 shows a roller skate that uses the heel yoke system of thisinvention. It shows that this heel yoke system can take various formsand can be used in conjunction with other systems.

The heel yoke anchors 14 are replaced by special yoke anchors 15 thathave ridges 70. The ridges 70 are intended to bite into the sole of theuser's shoes. The width adjustment screws 28 are not present because thewidth of the heel yoke system is adjusted by the use of an old fashionedroller skate key. The width at the front of the roller skate also uses aroller skate key and clamps onto the user's shoes just like the oldroller skates.

This embodiment of the heel yoke system uses all of the same straps andbuckles as the weight lifting sandals in FIGS. 1-7, but the roller skatedoes not use the rubber heel piece.

Accordingly the reader will see that the heel yoke system of thisinvention provides a method of securing articles to a user's shod footthat is effective, safe, low cost, highly adjustable, and easy tooperate.

Although the description above contains many specificities, exactdescriptions of the hardware and materials used may be innumerable. Theyoke anchors might not be adjustable for width and might be formedsimply by bending the metal edges of a roller skate up or down, or theheel yoke could have small cylindrical ends that go into holes drilledthrough the holding screw. Examples shown should therefore not beconstrued as limiting the scope of this invention but as merelyproviding illustrations of some of the presently preferred embodiments.

REFERENCE NUMERALS USED IN DRAWINGS 12 heel yoke 14 heel yoke anchor 15special yoke anchor 16 vertical slot 18 horizontal slot 20 washer 22holding screw 23 square section 24 wing nut 26 width adjustment slot 28width adjustment screw 30 tee nut 32 brass grommet 34 long strap 35 longstrap's end 36 heel buckle strap 38 front strap 40 front grommet 42buckle 44 recess 46 base plate 47 hole 48 T plate 50 covering plate 52bottom plate 54 front bottom plate 60 non-slip surface 62 curved heelsection 64L left tab 64R right tab 66 rubber laminate 70 ridge

1. a heel yoke system wherein a heel yoke is secured at its ends to anarticle of sporting gear by a means that allows for variable placementof said ends whereby the placement of said heel yoke can be adjusted tofit a variety of shoes.
 2. the heel yoke system of claim one wherein themeans is pins which protrude through vertical slots near the ends of theheel yoke whereby said slots can be slid up and down on the pins toaffect the height of the heel yoke.
 3. the heel yoke system of claim onewherein the means is pins that can be positioned forward and backward onthe article of sporting gear to affect the fore and aft position of theheel yoke.
 4. the heel yoke system of claim 2 wherein the pins can bepositioned forward and backward on the article of sporting gear toaffect the fore and aft position of the heel yoke.
 5. the heel yokesystem of claim one wherein the article of sporting gear is equippedwith movable parts that the heel yoke attaches to whereby the width ofthe heel yoke system can be adjusted.
 6. the heel yoke system of claimtwo wherein the article of sporting gear is equipped with movable partsthat the heel yoke attaches to whereby the width of the heel yoke systemcan be adjusted.
 7. the heel yoke system of claim three wherein thearticle of sporting gear is equipped with movable parts that the heelyoke attaches to whereby the width of the heel yoke system can beadjusted.
 8. the heel yoke system of claim four wherein the article ofsporting gear is equipped with movable parts that the heel yoke attachesto whereby the width of the heel yoke system can be adjusted.